Treatment of solid waste continues to be on the political agenda. Waste disposal issues are often viewed from an environmental perspective, but economic and social aspects also need to be considered when deciding on waste strategies and policy instruments. The aim of this paper is to suggest flexible and robust strategies for waste management in Sweden, and to discuss different policy instruments. Emphasis is on environmental aspects, but social and economic aspects are also considered. The results show that most waste treatment methods have a role to play in a robust and flexible integrated waste management system, and that the waste hierarchy is valid as a rule of thumb from an environmental perspective. A review of social aspects shows that there is a general willingness among people to source separate wastes. A package of policy instruments can include landfill tax, an incineration tax which is differentiated with respect to the content of fossil fuels and a weight based incineration tax, as well as support to the use of biogas and recycled materials.

The credibility of think tanks is grounded in their image as independent experts. In order to gain authority to act, think tanks must be seen as independent, but in order to exert influence and gain funding, think tanks are forced to compromise this independent image. We focus on how think tanks handle this independence paradox. How do think tanks use different resources to construct an independent image? The aim of the article is conceptual, as we develop a theoretical model of the independence paradox. This conceptual work is based on empirical analysis of attempts by think tanks in Poland and Sweden to create independence while maintaining influence. The two desirables central for think tanks, independence and influence, force them to make strategic choices about their relations with various actors. We conclude that the processes of keeping distance and arranging proximity are at the core of the independence paradox.

Taking the contemporary political activism of 'the Global Justice Movement' as an illustrative case, this article scrutinizes some influential theoretical ideas about the consequences of 'individualization' for collective political action. Quite often, this process is seen as implying a new politics of individual life style -'life politics' -which is associated with new social movements and claimed to have gained importance since the 1960s, on the expense of the collective 'emancipatory politics' being associated with 'old social movements' such as the Labor Movement. In the light of the article's empirical findings, this alleged division between life politics and emancipatory politics is questioned, and it is argued that these two kinds of politics should be understood as intertwined practices. The article's theoretically grounded analysis is based on quantitative data from a survey of participants at the fifth European Social Forum. These data are interpreted and further explored using qualitative interviews with activists.

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These questions are addressed throughout the book by way of illustrative cases demonstrating the various ways in which corporations pursue political activities in the broad sense and how they aim to influence policy. One by one and taken together the chapters present an understanding of how corporate governance is pursued and with what types of consequences. Corporate ascendancy has emerged as a universal organizing principle in the contemporary world. Corporations, and their funded offsprings, appear as both heroes and villains in tales of political and policy change. Proponents often present them as the 'new', responsible kind of corporate actors that global politics need, building networks across national borders and contributing to multi-stakeholders' solutions to complex issues. Sceptics view them as cunning organizations, barely masking their financial interests behind a thin layer of social and political concern. Both camps, however, would not deny the fact that corporate influence in what was usually seen as a nation-state domain of political affairs, have gained tremendous leverage over the last few decades. Through vast ideological shifts in the late twentieth century, markets rather than governments came to be seen as the more effective governance and the road to prosperity. Governments came to seek out the managerial expertise, technology and investment resources that corporations can bring. The corporate social responsibility movement (CSR) expresses this contemporary and double image of the corporation, as both a potentially accountable 'corporate